The Kenyan parliament has said that the kenyan judgement system is incompetent, as Kenyan parliamentarians defeated an attempt to set up a local tribunal on Thursday. This therefore calls for the need of the perpetrators of the Kenyan 2008 post-election violence to be tried at the International Criminal Court (ICC) at the Hague.
Kenya’s president Mr. Mwai Kibaki and Prime Minister Mr. Raila Odinga attended the session of parliament, which was expected to vote for the perpetrators of the 2008 post-election violence to be tried in Kenya, but were met with opposition as MPs took a stand against them saying that they did not have faith in Kenya’s justice system and that those involved in the violence should be tried at The Hague, in the Netherlands.
Prompted by the large impasse at the Kenyan parliament, former United Nations Secretary General announced that he was “disappointed that the Constitution of Kenya Amendment Bill 2009, which would have paved the way for the establishment of a Special Tribunal in Kenya, was defeated in Parliament.”
The tribunal was recommended by a report from a commission of inquiry, established during mediation talks chaired by former UN chief Mr. Kofi Annan chaired by Justice Philip Waki who gave a 1 March deadline for the tribunal to be set up. If the country is unable to set up an appropriate tribunal to deal with the 10 suspects before the deadline, the African Eminent Personalities forum, appointed by the African Union to deal with the post-electoral violence and also headed by Kofi Annan, may have to hand over the list of suspects to the ICC.
Recommendations made by the commission of inquiry suggested that the perpetrators of the violence should be tried at the ICC. It also recommended extensive police and national security reforms to safeguard national security while preventing another security crisis. Annan has indicated that he will keep to the “spirit, letter and intent” of the report.
Resign
Meanwhile, members of the Kenyan parliament have asked the president and prime minister to resign, claiming that they both have let the kenyan people down. Minister for Nairobi Metropolitan Development Mutula Kilonzo, who was part of the mediation team that crafted the power-sharing agreement, said the two leaders no longer had the mandate to lead the country.
Widespread clashes broke out after Mr Odinga said the results of the December 2007 election had been rigged in favor of the president. After weeks of talks led by Mr. Annan, in February 2008 the rivals agreed to share power to bring an end to the violence. In December 2008, the Electoral Commission of Kenya, which presided over the controversial poll, was disbanded by parliament following recommendations by another inquiry into the voting process.
